


Bittersweet

by Severina



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Community: tamingthemuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-16
Updated: 2012-12-16
Packaged: 2017-11-21 06:17:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/594427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He doesn’t expect a visitor, but he leaves the door of his room open a crack while he’s showering, in case… well, in case.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bittersweet

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LJ's tamingthemuse community, for the prompt "bittersweet"
> 
> * * *

The rooms Jenner assigns them are offices, each with its own private bathroom. Daryl peels off his clothes and leaves them in an untidy pile by the door, makes sure that his crossbow is close at hand just outside the sliding shower stall door before he steps under the hot water. Jenner says the place is clear, but that first week that him and Merle were out on their own Daryl came across plenty of places that people said were clear of walkers that turned out to be not so clear after all. It ain’t that he don’t trust the egghead, it’s just that he’s leaving nothing to chance; once he’s done a thorough inspection of the whole damn CDC facility himself, then maybe he’ll consider letting his guard down a little.

He turns the water on as hot as he can stand it, stands with his head thrown back; closes his eyes as the scalding water courses over his hair and trickles down his spine. Lets it sluice away the sludge of weeks in the bush, of dirt grimed so thoroughly into his pores that it feels like a second skin. There’s Irish Spring in the soap dish and shampoo that a person would think smells like raspberry if they never actually smelled a real raspberry growing on the vine, but he ain’t real particular after suffering through weeks of cold water dips in the quarry with only a sliver of hotel soap that he picked up way back when he thought this damn thing would blow over in a week or two. He’ll smell like fake raspberry any day if it’ll just make him clean again.

He doesn’t expect a visitor, but he leaves the door of his room open a crack while he’s showering, in case… well, in case. 

He heads down to dinner alone.

* * *

When the food’s been eaten and everybody’s thrown enough alcohol down their gullets to drown a small town, Daryl retreats to his room. He figures on finishing off the bottle of whiskey, flaking out on the first soft and comfortable surface he’s had in weeks. Getting a good night sleep for once, the kind where he don’t wake up every half hour thinking that the wind in the trees or the snap of a twig is a walker staggering up to his tent, ready to bite and tear and rip him apart.

Instead, he paces. The room is too small, the air too stale. He can’t breathe. 

When the tap comes lightly at the door, he tenses. But it’s just Glenn, pushing the door open with steepled fingers and stumbling against the doorframe. When the kid grins loopily at him the tension leaves his body in a slow, easy slide. 

“Heyyyy,” Glenn says, and that one word is all it takes for Daryl to know that the kid is shitfaced – an all in, two sheets to the wind, going to be praying to the porcelain god kind of drunk. And he’s pretty sure the only thing Glenn had to drink at dinner was wine. All right, so maybe Daryl did encourage him a little, but fuck.

Kid’s a goddamn lightweight. 

When Glenn takes a couple of steps into the room and wobbles on his feet, Daryl barely reaches him in time to keep him from slamming face-first into the wall. The kid’s loose-limbed and giggly, and though he’s feeling pretty fucking trashed himself it still occurs to Daryl as he maneuvers Glenn toward the overstuffed sofa that this would be – could be – their first opportunity to do things up right. No more furtive gropes and hasty kisses behind the RV; no more sneaking off into the woods in the middle of the night, Glenn’s fingers digging into the rough bark of a tree as he thrusts slowly and carefully inside him, crossbow thumping against his back as he alternates between sucking on Glenn’s neck and scanning the area for stray walkers. 

But when Glenn plucks at his shirt to pull him down beside him on the sofa, Daryl merely curls around him. The kid wiggles and squirms as he tries to get comfortable, and Daryl stares at the overhead light and bites his cheek and tries not to think about how this is the first time they’ll ever have spent the night together. How good it feels to have Glenn beside him, warm in the circle of his arm. 

“Don’t you be droolin’ on me,” he warns when Glenn finally settles with his head pillowed on his chest. He feels the answering smile and fully expects to wake up with a damp shirt. He’s not sure when his hand moves to drift lazily through Glenn’s hair, but when Glenn shifts beneath him the movement stutters and stops, and Daryl runs through a dozen possible things to say before finally settling on, “You feel okay?”

He knows Glenn is still awake, can tell by the steady rise and fall of his thin chest. But he’s almost given up on an answer when Glenn finally murmurs, “I feel… safe.”

Daryl lies there thinking about that answer long after Glenn has started snoring.


End file.
